I got a Discovery cart today, and after 3 hours of twiddling around I have made *drum roll please* a non working copy of Shadow Dancer. I have two switches that I am not sure how to set, drive normal/option - and program lo/hi. I am using a very nice condition and 314 external drive for drive B. For the record I had it set on hi and normal, since I saw a pic of one set like this. Does anyone out there have any utilities disks for the DC? All the disks I got with mine are a little flaky. Also if there is anything newer than 2.6 backup utilities that might be nice. I am going to bed, it is 3am and I can't take any more fiddling around with this thing! Now I see why some have said the DC is confusing and/or frustrating to use.

And then there's this one that I've just lifted from the Atari Age site, but extra files;

The only difference between 2.6 and 2.7, is that 2.7 can handle bigger configuration files (apparently). I seem to remember that that 2.7 from Atari Age has errors or something on it, although I'm not sure.

Thanks, I appreciate the help! I still wish I knew what the hi/lo switch was though. Maybe I'll just be brave and switch it to see what happens. I always figured the "option" switch was for the extra Mac option so I never messed with it.

The following is a list of the factory installed option configurations.The option number is marked in the space provided on the bottom of theunit. Refer to the rest of the documentation for a description of whatthe options do, if more information is needed.

The ROM/EPROM sockets can be used with a 64K byte program in ROMS orEPROMS. The MACINTOSH 64K ROMS could be used, allowing the MAGIC SACsoftware to operate. A jumper must be added by the user to select thestate of pin 1 on the ROMS or EPROMS. No ROMS or EPROMS are provided.The MAGIC SAC software is not included.

A 3rd and 4th floppy drive can be connected, allowing a total of 4floppy drives to be accessed from the desk top and most other software.

The ROM/EPROM sockets can be used with a 64K byte program in ROMS orEPROMS. The MACINTOSH 64K ROMS could be used, allowing the MAGIC SACsoftware to operate. No jumper is required. 128K byte ROMS could beused. The switch selects a bank of 64K which will be enabled at one time.No ROMS or EPROMS are provided. The MAGIC SAC software is not included.

A 3rd and 4th floppy drive can be connected, allowing a total of 4floppy drives to be accessed from the desk top and most other software.

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OPTION 3jack for plugging in a second cartridge

HAPPY COMPUTERS has tested and found that the MAGIC SAC and DESKCARTwill operate as a second cartridge with OPTION 3. Other cartridgesmay also work. The SPECTRE 128 does not work. Also, see options 5 or 6.We do not guarantee that any cartridge will work as a second cartridge.Some L shaped cartridges may not even fit as a second cartridge.

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OPTION 4jack for plugging in a second cartridge3rd drive option switch3rd and 4th drive circuitry and connector

HAPPY COMPUTERS has tested and found that the MAGIC SAC and DESKCARTwill operate as a second cartridge with OPTION 4. Other cartridgesmay also work. The SPECTRE 128 does not work. Also, see options 5 or 6.We do not guarantee that any cartridge will work as a second cartridge.Some L shaped cartridges may not even fit as a second cartridge.

A 3rd and 4th floppy drive can be connected, allowing a total of 4floppy drives to be accessed from the desk top and most other software.

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OPTION 5jack for plugging in a second cartridge2nd cartridge enable switch3rd drive option switch3rd and 4th drive circuitry and connector

HAPPY COMPUTERS has tested and found that the MAGIC SAC and DESKCARTand SPECTRE 128 will operate as a second cartridge with OPTION 5.Many other cartridges may work with option 5 that do not work withoptions 3 or 4. We do not guarantee that any cartridge will work asa second cartridge. Some L shaped cartridges may not even fit as asecond cartridge. The 2nd cartridge switch allows the user to selectwhether the 2nd cartridge or the DISCOVERY CARTRIDGE is enabled.

A 3rd and 4th floppy drive can be connected, allowing a total of 4floppy drives to be accessed from the desk top and most other software.

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OPTION 6jack for plugging in a second cartridge2nd cartridge enable switch

HAPPY COMPUTERS has tested and found that the MAGIC SAC and DESKCARTand SPECTRE 128 will operate as a second cartridge with OPTION 6.Many other cartridges may work with option 6 that do not work withoptions 3 or 4. We do not guarantee that any cartridge will work asa second cartridge. Some L shaped cartridges may not even fit as asecond cartridge. The 2nd cartridge switch allows the user to selectwhether the 2nd cartridge or the DISCOVERY CARTRIDGE is enabled.

The ROM/EPROM sockets can be used with a 128K byte contiguous programcontained in ROMS or EPROMS. The MACINTOSH 128K ROMS could be used,but the SPECTRE 128 software still will not operate without someadditional changes, which are listed in the documentation. HAPPYCOMPUTERS cannot currently provide a DISCOVERY CARTRIDGE whichallows running the SPECTRE 128 software by simply plugging in theMACINTOSH 128K ROMS. No ROMS or EPROMS are included. No SPECTRE 128SOFTWARE is included.

A 3rd and 4th floppy drive can be connected, allowing a total of 4floppy drives to be accessed from the desk top and most other software.

If I don't answer or appear to have forgotton then email again, I'm scatty!

It would seem you have a Spectre 128 Mac emulator in the cartridge. Apparently if you connect an 800k floppy to it then the older type Mac disks can be read and written to. People used to buy an Atari and one of these carts because they were untold cheaper than a real Mac.

An update to the above. Just found a post by Discovery Cartridge guru Ijor on Atariage forums.

There is not much in common between the Spectre and the DC. They are mentioned together many times, because if you own a DC you can use a pirated copy of Magic Sac and (with some limitations) of Spectre 128 as well.

The DC is a device for handling foreign disk formats and copy protections. The Spectre GCR is a Mac emulator with a hardware add-on for accessing Mac GCR disks.

I "discovered" something interesting today. If I use the SAME disk drive to copy to, rather than my 2nd drive, I have better results, perfect results actually, copying heavily protected original games. (I was wondering if that was because it might be picky about even the slightest rotation speed differences of two different drives, whereas if you write with the same drive the disk was read from, it would obviously have the same rotation speed.) The cart works like a dream! I thought it actually *needed* a second drive, like on the Synchro Express where it would copy and write at the same time, but apparently the Discovery Cart doesn't write until it has read the whole disk, so you only need one drive to copy disks. Pretty awesome so far! Thanks for all the info and files guys! (and/or gals as the case may be)

I sold mine when I got it as part of a big bundle as was never going to use it - hindsight being such a wonderful thing that it is! Anyways, does the DC let you dump the files to an attached h/drive or is it a complete take-over of the system so that all you can do is duplicate protected disks?

I develop a free Word (for Windows) add-in that's available for Word 2007 upwards. It's a fix-it toolbox that will allow power Word users to fix document errors. You can find it at: http://www.mikestoolbox.co.uk

It doesn't hijack anything as far as I can tell, i can even play games with it plugged in. It has its own copier software, for either mac or ST disks, and you just run the software and copy away, either floppy to floppy, or floppy to image file which I assume could be saved to a hard disk. (havent actually done it yet)

I develop a free Word (for Windows) add-in that's available for Word 2007 upwards. It's a fix-it toolbox that will allow power Word users to fix document errors. You can find it at: http://www.mikestoolbox.co.uk

STcomp wrote:I "discovered" something interesting today. If I use the SAME disk drive to copy to, rather than my 2nd drive, I have better results, perfect results actually, copying heavily protected original games.

Yes I've found that with mine. There are *certain* drives which for some unknown reason it simply doesn't like. Only one of my STFM internals works well (out of a selection of 5 or so), and only one of the external ones (a Cumana I think). If I use the other drives then it'll either fail, or produce a useless disk. For *normal* use however, loading games, reading/writing disks, all of the other drives are fine.

One would think a faulty drive. Except that they're not. HCDC just seems to be really fussy. Dungeon Master and Oids have to be the two most awkward disks I have. They're the benchmark.

If I don't answer or appear to have forgotton then email again, I'm scatty!

The Spectre 128 is just a cart with the two 128k ROMs (2x64k?) out of a Mac. The Magic Sac was the older type with the 64k ROMs. So a discovery cart with the ROMs in it will work exactly as a Spectre would. Great piece of kit back in the day, nowadays people pay you money to take the old macs away